HAS CHRIST’S COMING CHANGED ME?

Luke 6:13-16, Ac 4:13

Precious Father, Lord Jesus, Holy Spirit,

The Christmas season has faded from the calendar. The stores have marked all of their holiday items down to 50% and even 70% off the "before" Christmas retail price. The radio station in town that has played Christmas music for two months returned to its secular format on December 26. We are taking down the tree and putting the decorations in storage for another year.

Christmas Day has come and gone. I have thought much of Your coming to earth as God made flesh to live among us. But as I consider the first coming of the Lord, I must ask myself, "So what?" How am I different? How has Your coming changed me?

In order to answer that question I must ask it about others. "What change did Jesus make in the lives of the people who knew Him best?" You certainly turned things upside down for Mary and Joseph! The people of Bethlehem were never the same again. Their adoration and loyalty to You cost many families the lives of their infant sons. Perhaps some of the very shepherds who had adored You upon Your birth, now had empty cradles and shattered lives.  Anna and Simeon could die in peace because they had seen the Lord. The Wise Men were convinced they had met the Son of God, the King of the Jews. Each who encountered You in the Christmas narrative was forever changed.

What about those who knew You best in life and ministry? How did Your coming change them? Church tradition recites many of their deaths. James was the first martyr, thrown off the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. Matthew was martyred in Ethiopia. Mark was dragged through the streets of Alexandria, Egypt until dead. Hanging on a Grecian hillside was Doctor Luke’s end. Peter was crucified upside down in Rome. Bartholomew, Andrew, Thomas, Jude, Matthais, Barnabas, and Paul–all died martyr’s deaths. Only John lived out his full years, dying in his nineties. But it was not for a lack of trying. John’s would be assassin had attempted to fry the preacher alive in a caldron of boiling oil, but John had escaped.

Why were they willing, even eager to die for You? Because Your coming had changed them. They had met Messiah and were compelled to follow You to their own cross of sacrifice. Tertullian said it well, "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church."

So, I come back to my question. I have traded an old calendar for a new. Christmas is a fading memory, and the question is still nagging at my mind. "How has Christ’s coming changed me?"

So, I follow. I follow You. I serve You. I obey You. I refuse to return to status quo.

In the Name of the God who never leaves me the same,

Amen.